RU-486: A Bitter Pill

Human Life Review, Summer 2006 by Echevarria, Laura

On September 28, 2000, I appeared on the PBS program The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer to discuss the Clinton-era PDA's approval of the abortion drug RU-486.1 was debating the then-president of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Gloria Feldt, who called the approval "a giant step forward for women, a quantum leap in reproductive health technology and an option that American women have wanted for many years."

I have no doubt she'd say the same thing today. But my own warning on that program has been borne out by events. I said that "the chance of a woman dying as a result of taking RU-486 still exists," despite the FDA protocols that Feldt was confident would protect women; and since then, at least five American women have died following RU-486 abortions.

A deadly and dangerous drug

These are not mere statistics; they were flesh-and-blood young women. There was Orianne Shevin, a 34-year-old attorney and mother of two young children from Sherman Oaks, Calif., who died in June 2005. There was Hoa Thuy Tran, a 21-year-old mother of one who died in 2003; Holly Patterson, the California teen who died in September of that same year; and Chanelle Bryant of Pasadena, California who died in December 2004. These women all died of deadly bacterial infections following RU-486 abortions. Then there was Brenda Vise of Chattanooga, Tenn., who died in September 2001 of an undetected tubal pregnancy that ruptured. (RU-486 has no impact on ectopic pregnancies and is contraindicated in such instances.) Investigations of two recently reported deaths concluded that one of the deaths was unrelated to the abortion method. The other death is still under investigation.1

Severe side effects and near-deaths connected with this abortion method may be underreported. It is mandatory for drug manufacturers to report deaths or side effects associated with a drug-but for doctors, such reporting is only on a voluntary basis. Yet even the voluntary reports submitted so far are shocking. In the February 2006 issue of Annals of Pharmacotherapy, Doctors Margaret Gary and Donna Harrison reported their findings about over 600 "adverse event reports," or AERs, received by the FDA between September 2000 and September 2004 concerning the RU-486 abortion method.2

According to Gary and Harrison, the most common complications were hemorrhage, infection, and ruptured ectopic pregnancy. Other complications included heart attack, pulmonary embolism, pancreatitis, and allergic reactions. Several patients had continuing pregnancies because the abortion drug combination "failed" to cause an abortion.

What is known in shorthand as "RU-486" is actually a two-drug abortion technique: The first drug is RU-486 itself, known genetically as mifepristone, and the second is a prostaglandin, known by the generic name misoprostol. RU-486 only "works" in a confirmed pregnancy and is only approved for use by the FDA in pregnancies up to 49 days or seven weeks.

RU-486 acts by blocking progesterone; as a result of this blockage the woman's body fails to recognize that she is pregnant, and in turn causes the death of her unborn child by cutting off the critical supply of nutrients needed by the developing baby. According to FDA protocols, the second drug-the prostaglandin misoprostol-is supposed to be given to the woman orally. Its action is to cause uterine contractions that expel the now-dead baby.

Significantly, in each of the four known cases involving deadly infections, the women were given the misoprostol, the second drug, to take vaginally and at home. There is suspicion that deviating from the PDA-approved guidelines for RU-486 may make a woman susceptible to an infection that can be lethal. But doctors sometimes use FDA-approved drugs for uses other than those for which they were originally intended, and change the dosage levels or the way a drug is administered. For example, alternate protocols, developed by the abortion industry and promoted by the National Abortion Federation, include changing the dosages of the drugs involved in the RU486 abortion method.

In addition, in the September 2005 issue of the Annals ofPharmacotherapy, Ralph Miech-a retired Brown University professor of molecular pharmacology, physiology, and biotechnology-wrote that there is reason to believe that RU-486 itself may suppress a woman's immune system, leaving her body without its normal defenses. Prior to the four deaths from infection, deadly infections from the type of bacteria responsible, Clostridiwn sordellii, were considered rare.3

In addition to blocking progesterone, RU-486 also acts as an antiglucocorticoid. Glucocorticoids are a class of hormones that are produced in the adrenal system and include cortisol. When these hormones are produced properly and at the right levels, they work to maintain body temperature, regulate our metabolisms and reinforce the immune system.

Renate Klein, a biologist and co-author of the book RU-486 Misconceptions, Myths and Morals, is an associate professor in women's studies at Deakin University in Melbourne, Australia. She and several other pro-abortion feminists were early critics of RU-486. In December 2005, Klein addressed the immunosuppressive characteristics of RU-486 in an opinion piece: "The Canadian woman's death in 2001 [during the Canadian trials for RU-486] was explained by pointing to the antiglucocorticoid effect of RU-486. This weakens a woman's immune system, making it impossible for her to fight bacteria, and leads to septic shock and rapid death."4